How To Add Charts And Graphs To WordPress

You’ve no doubt heard the saying “a picture is worth a thousand words.” This is certainly true when you are trying to present or explain complex information.

Using charts and graphs is a great way to break up long text passages, and make data much simpler to grasp.

You can use tables to present data, but if you want people to try and make sense of complex information with figures, percentages and relationships easily, then graphs and charts are perfect for helping them visualize the data.

Charts and graphs help explain complex information so your audience can more easily understand it!

Need to add charts or graphs to WordPress? This tutorial shows you how to use the WP Visualizer plugin – a simple, easy to use and powerful tool that allows you to create, manage and insert colorful and dynamic graphs and charts into your WordPress posts and pages that:

• Your site visitors can engage with
• Allows you to upload data from your hard drive or a web-based source of data
• Will resize dynamically for mobile viewing

If you plan to display visual data like pie charts, comparison charts or trending graphs containing static information (e.g. historical data), an easier way to add the data is to create the charts or graphs using an image editing application, convert these into jpg or png files and then simply insert the image into your posts or pages.

Use WordPress Chart & Graph Plugins

If you want to add interactive bar charts and pie charts to WordPress with no coding skills required, the easiest way to do this is to use a plugin.

Fortunately, there is a WordPress plugin that is simple to install, easy-to-use and allows you to not only create stunning and mobile-responsive graphs and charts, it also lets you populate your charts and graphs with dynamic data.

Visualizer Plugin For WordPress

Visualizer URL

You can install the plugin from your WordPress dashboard (we show you how to do this further below), or access and download WP Visualizer here:

http://wordpress.org/plugins/visualizer

Plugin Description

WP Visualizer is a simple, easy to use and powerful WordPress plugin that lets you create, manage and insert colorful graphs into your WordPress posts and pages in a few mouse clicks.

Visualizer uses Google Visualization API to render charts, which support cross-browser compatibility (adopting VML for older IE versions) and cross-platform portability to iOS and new Android releases, and are based on pure HTML5/SVG technology (adopting VML for old IE versions), so no additional addons are required.

The plugin also provides a variety of built-in optimized for all your data visualization needs, including:

• Line chart
• Area chart
• Bar chart
• Column chart
• Pie chart
• Geo chart
• Gauge chart
• Candlestick chart
• Scatter chart

Visualizer is also flexible and customizable, allowing you to use Google Chart Tools with their default setting, or configure an extensive set of options to match your site’s design. Various options are available for each chart that let you customize their settings.

Additionally, charts are rendered using HTML5/SVG technology to provide cross-browser compatibility (including VML for older IE versions) and cross platform portability to iPhones, iPads and Android devices. Your web visitors can see your charts and graphs on their mobile browsers without having to install additional plugins.

Plugin Installation

From your WordPress administration area, select Plugins > Add New from the navigation sidebar menu …

In the Add Plugins page type “visualizer” into the search field and hit enter …

Locate Visualizer in the search results section and click Install Now …

Click OK to proceed …

Activate the plugin after installing it …

You can also activate the plugin in the Plugins section …

Once the plugin has been activated, click on Library …

You can get to the plugin’s ‘library’ screen by selecting Media > Visualizer Library from your main menu …

This takes you to the plugin’s Visualizer Library page …

When you first install the plugin, the library contains no charts.

The next step is to add add charts and graphs to the plugin library.

How To Configure Visualizer

To add a new chart or graph to the library, click on ‘Add New’ …

You will see all of the kinds of graphs available.

Select the chart or graph type you would like to create and click on the ‘Next’ button …

Your graph/chart type will open up in a new window.

The next step is to upload a CSV file with your data …

When creating your CSV data file, ensure that:

• The first row contains your column headings.
• The second row contains the series type (e.g. boolean, timeofday, etc.)

The screenshot below shows how to format your data as explained above …

If you are unsure about how to format your CSV file, simply use the sample file that comes with the plugin.

Next, select the data source (‘From Computer’ or ‘From Web’) in the ‘Upload CSV File’ section.

Upload CSV File From Computer

To upload a CSV file and data from your hard drive select ‘From Computer‘ …

Use the browser to locate and select your data file and click on ‘Open‘ …

The plugin will import your data and display it using the graph/chart type chosen …

Upload CSV File From The Web

To learn how to create, save and publish data to a Visualizer chart or graph using Google Spreadsheet, see the article below:

• How To Populate Data Using Google Spreadsheet

After importing the data, check that all of the information is correct (if not, click on the ‘Back’ button and reupload a data file with the right data), and click ‘Next‘ …

Depending on the chart or graph type you have picked, the plugin displays a number of customization options and settings …

Visualizer gives you full control of your chart or graph, and updates your display in real time …

For example, the pie chart offers various configurable options, such as:

• General Settings – Configure chart title settings, font styles, tooltip, and legend.
• Pie Settings – Create 3D pie charts, draw slices counterclockwise, set the text content displayed on the slice, create a “donut” pie chart, rotate the chart’s “start” angle and set the slice border color.
• Residue Settings – Set the ‘Visibility Threshold’ (the slice relative part, below which a slice will not show individually.), ‘Residual Slice Label’ (the label for the combination slice that holds all slices below slice visibility threshold, e.g. “Other”), and ‘Residue Slice Color’.
• Slice Settings – Customize the ‘Slice Offset’ (how far to separate a slice from the rest of the pie), and ‘Slice Color’.
• Layout & Chart Area – Configure the layout (total size of chart) including the width and height of the chart as a number of percentage, background color for the main area of the chart and the chart border width and color, and the placement and size of the chart area (where the chart itself is drawn, excluding axis and legends).

Once you’re happy with how your chart or graph is looking, click Create Chart …

Your new graph or chart will now be added to your Visualizer ‘Library’ …

Note that new elements are given a unique ID displayed as a shortcode. As you will see in just a moment, this allows you to easily embed charts and graphs into your content …

Charts and graphs added to the Visualizer Library can be accessed by their type …

After adding an item to the ‘Visualizer Library’, you can edit it, duplicate it, or trash it …

Visualizer Plugin Usage

After creating a element and adding it to the Library, it’s very easy to insert it into your content.

First, create a new post or page (or open an existing one) …

Next, place your mouse cursor where you want to insert your visual element into the content and click on the ‘Add Media‘ button …

Click on ‘Visualizations‘ …

Select the graph or chart to be inserted into your content and click the “insert” icon …

This adds a shortcode for the element into your content …

Once you have finished adding your item, click on Publish to publish (or update) your content …

Once your post/page has been updated, click ‘View post’ to see the result …

You will see your graph or chart in the location you specified …

As mentioned previously, Visualizer also displays responsive graphs and charts for mobile viewing …

As you can see, Visualizer lets you add and customize dynamic charts and graphs in your content. You can change your data and your changes will automatically be reflected throughout your website. This is very convenient if you’re working with interactive graph information in WordPress.

The plugin developers have created a number of tutorials you can refer to to learn how to edit, customize and use WordPress Visualizer.

For tutorials on editing, copying, deleting and adding data to your charts, visit the website below:

• WordPress Visualizer – Additional Tutorials

Congratulations! Now you know how to add colorful and dynamic bar charts and graphs to WordPress with WP Visualizer.

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